WTF?

     

Every morning I dread bringing up the online news. The relentless bad news is  not a good way to start a day. And today there was this profoundly sad piece in the Washington Post on the oldest trees in the world now in great danger:

           Scientists rush to save 1,000-year-old trees on the brink of death   

                           

A new study, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, found that climate change has pushed almost a quarter of Earth’s best-protected forests to a “critical threshold” for lost resilience — the point at which even a minor drought or heat wave could tip them into catastrophic decline. Washington Post 07/16/22

Also today we have Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, coal baron extraordinaire and stalwart defender of the beleaguered fossil fuel industry, again in the news. Manchin has set himself up as the self appointed linchpin for the Demos getting anything passed at all this term regarding the now whittled down almost forgotten 'Build Back Better' plan and its climate crisis component, He has now decided to pull the plug on voting for it at all.  This has left poor Biden stood up, broken-hearted again.

But as bad as Manchin's Lucy snatching the football stunt is, the antics of the Supreme Court are the far worst. The West Virginia vs the EPA is a disastrous decision for the environment in general and confronting Global Warming specifically. This grave mistake by this science blind dogma-driven majority now makes it virtually impossible for the US to come anywhere near its COP26 commitments (that we were already doing poorly on anyway).

This idiotic ruling comes despite recent Condition Red warnings from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), alarm of the entire scientific community as well as hundreds of environmental organizations up in arms. These six stupid bastards must have cotton stuffed in their ears and blinders on.  Can't they see the ecocidal disasters on all sides already - ever worsening floods, droughts (the entire Western US bone dry), fires (the giant sequoias of Yosemite are in danger of burning up), storms (tornadoes in the winter?); awful signs every directions like huge parts chunks of West Antarctica may soon slide into the ocean raising sea levels everywhere.

This landmark judicial blunder, besides preventing the EPA from confronting fossil fuel emissions from power companies using the Clean Air Act, does far more harm. It also undermines the executive's branch general overall authority to delegate implementation of laws through government agencies. A staggering array of federal rules are now potentially vulnerable to cancellation by further law suits against federal agencies routinely enforcing long standing existing federal mandates and laws, ones accepted as reasonable and necessary. The American right is in the process of eviscerating the authority of the federal government to confront rapacious corporate behavior in all directions. This all under the rubric of reining in what they call the 'administrative state'. This has been in the works since the so-called Reagan Revolution, through Newt Gingrich's Contract on American and the fake populist Tea Party Movement.

The court in West Virginia vs the EPA is now requiring any major legislation on what Roberts calls “major questions” to be fully defined in term of implemen-tation which, of course, is impossible. Policy wonks (often in a revolving door w/ industry) within every agency are the only ones who have the in-house expertise to get 'into the weeds' of the complex arcane technical issues that will arise. It is a crazy irresponsible move against routine and necessary authority of governance. It's neoliberalism on steroids; it's boldly jumping in bed with Ayn Rand and her nutty ultra-libertarianism. Why remove the authority of the alphabet soup of agencies that keep things running halfway sanely? Think the FAA and the air travel; the FDA and pharmaceuticals and food safety, Medicare/ Medicaid and profit driven health insurance companies, the SEC and the financial sector.

And the Roberts Court specifically timed their attack on the EPA 's authority just as we eat into the last decade before all hell breaks loose (global temperature must not increase another 1.5C or our gooses are cooked). The EPA with what authority it had under the Clean Air was trying to act to address the painful transition from fossil fuel to sustainable sources. The EPA had to take charge due to the GOP's collective intransigence on any pro- environmental legislation especially any confronting Climate Change .

In this ruling the court killed three birds with one stone. First the existing Clean Water and Clean Air Acts enforced by the EPA was all that stood in the way of doing nothing – the GOP's preference. Secondly it effectively attacks the authority of the executive branch at the same time. And finally mixing this ground breaking decision in with two other equally dramatic extremely unpopular decisions regarding abortion and guns, it deflects attention from its serious implications.

Short term we are in very bad shape . The pitifully weak resistance for decades of the Democratic Party to the hard charging, take no prisoners, ruthless ethics-free GOP (on steroids during the Trump era) is only part of the problem. Even as Donald Trump as president made a joke out of the office until the pandemic hit and he spent too much time in denial as hundreds of thousands died, many needlessly. Before that he seemed graced with fair winds especially riding on the momentum of an Obama's necessary but weak Keynesian stimulus-prodded recovery that was still growing from the post 2008 Great Recession. But as bad as the Trump regime was, the 2020 voters did not producd any Blue Wave with the Demos barely winning the Senate by a razor thin Senate margin -  but with two turn-coat spoilers embedded.

But beyond the Demos loss of support of much of the rural and rust-belt white working class (mostly due to ossification and overemphasis on identity politics and cancel culture BS), other forces were also at work. Plain old bad luck confronts them.There is the pandemic distorted global economy created shortages and the biggie, the devil incarnate - Inflation. Then there is the perceived crime wave. Add to that, the geopolitical catastrophe of Vladimir Putin's stupid pointless neo czarist Ukraine War which puts a super charger on existing but tolerable supply chain drive inflation with energy and food prices exploding. And underlying that is corporate opportunism. Monopoly and oligopoly market control in many industries is allowing widened corporate profit margins to be tacked on to existing price increases. Net result: hard working but uninspiring and charisma-challenged Joe Biden and his Democratic Party gets blamed for it all.

In these dark times one can only hope a coalition of the sane will come together composed of those with social and environmentally consciousness but without unreal expectations together with those with conservative values in the original sense of the word, who are level headed and fair minded and not driven by craven political ambition or cynical pecuniary opportunism. Together maybe these two factions can effectively confront the crazies that have invaded this country from within.

Ill winds are blowing our way

 

Every day now the news feels like a cold wet smack in the face. Below are some examples. 

 

The Biden agenda slogs along under-performing in the eyes of most Americans. But his administration is beset with mostly inherited impossibly difficult problems not of their own making. Yet the failure of his 'progressive' agenda is thrown in our faces daily without mentioning that it is explicitly due to two Repubs in Demo clothing, especially one coal baron- senator from West Virginia who pretends to be a Democrat but really intends to wreck any Democratic Party agenda and any hopes of their surviving the next election cycle.

 

 

 

Omicron

 Covid-19 Delta has mutated into something even more  contagious - Omicron. As we wait to find out how bad it will be, Republican politicians and their media continue to sow discord specifically intended to lower Biden's popularity. Especially malicious is conflating requirements to get vaccinated, wearing masks indoors and taking common sense precautions as violating Constitutionally protected rights. This as their hand picked Supreme Court takes those very rights away from women.

 

 

Meanwhile armed wackos, young and old, continue to sporadically reap carnage in homes, schools, work places and Black neighborhoods (AKA “hoods”) everywhere. Plus in many cities dystopian zones have sprung up composed of the homeless, mentally ill and/or addicted. The police departments in cities feel understaffed and unappreciated with calls for “defunding”(that mostly never materialized). As a reaction 'the finest' seem to be engaged in an informal unacknowledged work slowdown allowing crime rate to soar thus building support for another Nixonian type call for law 'n order. All the videos we saw of summary executions of Blacks now forgotten.

 Inflation has returned despite assurances from the Demo party economists that it wouldn't. Nothing peeves the average Joe and Jill Normal more than prices going up (even as their incomes also rise). And to add insult to injury some store shelves are suddenly as bare as old Mother Hubbard's cupboard of something they need badly (like for me, cat food) as the pandemic continues to cause bottlenecks in the global supply chain. Inflation will surely be a handy noose to hang the Demos by for past expenditures as well proposed ones (except $$$ for the military). Inflation is more complicated than simply too many dollars chasing too few goods (demand pull). You have monopolistic 'price management', the Fed creating money to juice the economy, all kinds bottlenecks in the supply chain and pandemic induced increases in labor costs passed to on consumers (cost push).

 

 

 Helping to boost our military budget (see above) Vladimir Putin is threatening to invade and reclaim a big chunk of the old USSR, the Ukraine, while crafty old Xi Jinping has his eye on Taiwan. With all three sides here armed to the teeth with thermonuclear weapons and advanced delivery systems, we never know how close we are to WWIII which would make the Climate Crisis look like merely a picnic on a warm day.

 

 

 

 

 

 As bad as these things are, they can be seen as   temporary maladies. But for us in the USA something very sinister looms. An underlying threat that academics and Constitutional experts continue to flash red light warnings on - the machinations underway in Republican controlled states re: the survival of our democracy. A host of Republican controlled state legislatures are rewiring their state's election apparatus to not only make it more difficult to vote but commandeering the formerly non-partisan vote counting apparatus. Only Congress can step in and head off this threat to the very foundation of our imperfect but so far operational democracy, and again Joe Manchin stands in the way.

 

 

 

 

Then there is the really big one, the Climate Crisis. It is unfolding before our very eyes as our weather gets weirder and worsens (tornado swarms in winter, fire season all year, melting glaciers). The much ballyhooed COP26, in which the powers that be (minus one D. Trump) would finally get serious about global warming, was a big fat flopperoo. 195 nation's governments couldn't agree on jack shit. What a surprise. Commitment and follow-through at the top of each country's power structure is vital. Yet only with top down strongly enforced, far reaching and ambitious collectively embraced measures will we have any chance of slowing down the warming to avoid catastrophic mass extinctions (including us). Stopping it is now impossible. Our only chance now is mitigation. The entire world's 195 nations must be weaned from using fossil fuel as an energy source – and soon!.. Each nation's leader premier, prime minister, president, king or whatever the hell they call themselves must commit to a politically sensitive course of action; and they won't. They are politicians therefore they are afraid to or they may lose their jobs.

 

  Politicians, also known as our leaders (and all we have presently) are exactly the wrong ones to lead in such a crisis. Politicians, democratic or autocratic, are temporal actors who must survive in whatever political arena in which they exist. The system culls for ego-driven, alpha types. The ones at the top have managed through a mix of tenacity, verbal skills, charm, guile and often sheer ruthlessness to get to the top of of their particular dung heap of a political hierarchy.

 

 

Their survival as top dog depends on among other things in keeping their respective population materially pacified - or at least subdued through fear and/or cynicism. This as well as managing effective tactics against their internal political opponents. Also finally and importantly they must keep their respective capitalism-driven economies perking along well enough to maintain some degree of popular quiescence. Unfortunately these manifold immediate concerns always eclipse long term considerations or slowly emerging crises - like the overheating of an entire planet. Hence COP xxx (whatever number we are at) always tragically fails to deliver.  

The question is will we pull out of this civilizational nosedive or not?.

 

 

 

 

 

US Deficit - Keeping Zillionaires Happy

 

Here are some numbers to consider:

Total US Debt: $26 Trillion 

Wealth of top 1%: $42 Trillion

Total Wealth of bottom 50%: $3 Trillion

We could pay the ENTIRE national debt by simply taxing the top 1%, the amount we should have been taxing them to create an economy that made them rich.

Here's what that would look like: Total US Debt: $0

Total Wealth of Top 1%: $16 Trillion

Total Wealth of Bottom 50%: $3 Trillion

And when we are done, the US has NO debt, and the top 1% still have 5x what the bottom 50% has combined. We have plenty of money. It's time for the rich to pay their fair share.

 

If these numbers are anywhere near accurate, the present Congressional impasse is just more evidence of the lock the 1% have on our two parties. It is just another silly pissing contest between the unity-challenged Demos and their monolithic greed and power unified rivals.. The Repubs are entangling a 10 year plan to revamp our pitiful social support structure and one that also engages in the critically necessary infrastructure rebuild to confront the Climate Crisis with the ongoing budget Deficit that they helped create. By refusing to raise the debt limit at this critical juncture is typical of these PR manipulative assholes. And then there is the struggle between the Progressive Demos vs Moderate Demos or more exactly Demos vs the Repubs in their midst, further evidence of the hold the biggies have on all of this.

Today the NY Times In-House conservative columnist, Bret Stephens, weighed in supporting Senators Manchin's and Sinema's unconscionable stranglehold on Biden's agenda (see Bret Stephens 9/29/21 NY Times column ). Stephens argues for the Demos tossing in the towel and passing the climate-crisis-ignoring first tier minimalist $1.5B infrastructure bill only and walking away from the rest. This would be interpreted by the public (who basically support the entire package) and re-enforced by the media as a resounding defeat for Biden and the Democrats. Game over!  In the over 1700 comments to Stephens' BS-orama, Michael Collins of Benicia CA provided the above numbers.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Are we already in a 1970's dystopian nightmare?

                    Lake Oroville  Each year this lake helps water a quarter of the nation's crops,

Historic heat wave brings 100-degree heat to 40 million in western U.S.

More than 40 million Americans are in the crosshairs of extreme triple-digit heat this week, with some spots soaring over 120 degrees as records fall across the West. The heat in many areas is downright dangerous, prompting excessive heat warnings in seven states where temperatures will be hazardous to human health.

The heat also reinforces a devastating drought that continues to reshape the landscape of the West while simultaneously bolstering worries of what lurks ahead in the fall come fire season. More than half of the western U.S. is gripped by “extreme” or “exceptional” drought according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, in the two most severe categories. 

 

The above news is from the 06/15/21Washington Post. It could very well be an imagined news item in some 1970's dystopian sci-fi movie with the “greenhouse effect” as we called it then as the grim backdrop to the story (see Soylent Green (1973) with Charlton Heston). Well' folks we're there now. It's real; we did it. We let CO2 and methane trap so much heat that every summer is a crisis ridden mess – heat waves, Cat 5 storms, droughts, forest fires, deluges, mud slides and so on. It's just as they predicted. It got too GD hot. We did not do jack shit and we are still not doing jack shit to confront this very special world historical crisis. In the all important USA one entire political party believes it's all BS or at the very least an overblown other party's 'hobby horse'. The other party for it's part (until recently anyway) has responded weakly with do-gooder “green” talk about “sustainability' and “moving away from fossil fuels” but effectively doing little considering the gravity of the situation. But with so many distractions sapping the public's attention what can one expect  It's hard to keep your eye on the ball what with a grossly mismanaged pandemic, a home grown demagogue blowing away democratic norms, nuclear armed rivals vying for geopolitical power. And behind it all global capitalism creating a new plutocratic world order. This while reactionary medieval religio-cultural fanaticism attracts the young, underemployed and alienated.  That leaves little bandwidth left for the biggest crisis of all time- global ecocide. One wonders when the scientific commodity and the IPCC will finally throw in the towel and say. “Hey fuck it! It's too late now!”.

Bezos' New Boat

         This half a billion dollar monstrosity is being built for Amazon tycoon Jeff Bezos.

 

Ostentatious displays of wealth have always been a way for the rich and wannabe rich to show off. But recently it has gotten way uglier as millions suffer from a global economy suffocating pandemic while ole Jeff shows off the killing he made off of a literal killing. His wealth has gone up something like $57B since Covid19 hit as many people are stuck at home being forced to use his services.

Vast wealth concentrated in the coffers of a few Scrooge McDucks who figure out how to game the system has existed since the early days of capitalism. Their monopolistic ascent is usually accomplished by cornering a market for some essential commodity more recently PC operating systems, social media and in Bezos' case online retail. In Econ 101 we learn that such market dominance is called a monopoly and is considered a market deformity. And as such is illegal being deemed unfair even by the harsh standards of capitalism. Monopolies are seen as the very antithesis to our economy's primary engine - market competition. So way back in 1890 the Sherman Anti-Trust Law was enacted with others such legislation to follow (enforcement on the other hand has been another matter).

Beyond the known problem of greedy opportunists cornering markets, French economist Thomas Piketty in his landmark Capital in the Twenty-First Century (2013) has painstakingly laid out another even deeper problem. Piketty shows mathematically how something else has  gone wrong over the last 250 years. The returns on investment have gone well beyond the opportunities for investment. Thus massive amounts of  money (AKA capital) has a perverse tendency to accumulate uselessly, sitting idly in the hands of individuals, families, financial institutions or whatever with nowhere to go in terms of productive investment opportunities. So it ends up backed up and churning around uselessly (and often dangerously) in speculation, or simply pissed away in wasteful show-off purchases known as 'conspicuous consumption'. See Thorstien Veblen's Theory of the Leisure Class (1899).

The obvious solution which Piketty advocates is to hoover it all up or part of it in taxes and use it for the public good, which as we all know there is an overflowing immediate need for in every direction. But retrieving such accumulated wealth especially in the USA is not easy. In fact an entire political party has based anti-taxation as their one and only public policy position. And it's a popular one. People have always hated taxes. It has been historically a form of oppression especially by monarchies and other autocracies. However in recent times in the USA especially we have overdone it. We have embarrassingly let our entire physical infrastructure rot right out from under us. Anyone who has been to another developed country recently, even ones known to have suffered greatly after the 2008 recession, knows the shock upon returning and seeing the shabby conditions we now take for granted . We have been left behind in the dust still bumper to bumper, stranded in our no-exit traffic hell on our so-called “free”ways.

Our politicians on the left of the political spectrum like Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren and now (surprisingly) “moderate” Joe Biden realize that some of this accumulated sterile wealth must freed up for the greater good. The manifold disparate and desperate needs that surround us on every side need attention. But the Bidens of the world must walk on eggshells regarding the T-word lest they attract dangerous incoming artillery from the right. Yet only by restoring corporate and individual tax rates back to 1950's levels (the same 50s' that MAGA types so nostalgically long for) can we afford all that needs to be done. Furthermore, the obscenely huge fortunes that have grown like tumors all over the world need to be shrunken back through taxation.

But besides suggesting an increase in taxes (the dreaded T-word), but for only top tiers of income, the Biden administration is also vulnerable to attack due on the other right wing shibboleth, the dreaded I-word: Inflation. Growth in the past was usually bought at the expense of some degree of rising prices. It was an acceptable trade-off. High levels of employment equals some inflation. In fact the relationship is schematically depicted by the Phillips Curve which shows the relationship between growth and inflation. This acceptable trade-off broke down in the 1970s when inflation and high unemployment occurred simultaneously: It was called “stagflation”. It was primarily due to an inordinate rise in oil prices thanks to the formation of, yes, an oil quasi-monopoly – an oil cartel: OPEC. And it in a way it ended bipartisan support Keynesian government spending based fiscal policy and paved the myth of “supply side” Reagonomics.

Now fast forward to 2021 and Biden's progressive agenda. Already it has headwinds. The stock market is reacting negatively to minor inflation probably due to pandemic induced global supply chain disruptions and a hacker attack on an East Coast oil pipeline. It is not clear whether the massive Covid19 relief and vaccine distribution spending has led ot any inflation yet.. Most economists believe the very low interest rates on government bonds make it a good time to go deeper into debt since the needs are so great. But debt should not pay for all of it. Also increasing taxes on the Bezos types and corporations is way overdue. Both have been skating for too long. The Biden Administrations proposed massive expenditures, trillions!, only shows their recognition of the gravity of what we. It's a Triple Whammy: 1) a Covid19 induced economic crash; 2) a crumbling infrastructure; 3) a world historic ecological crisis requiring a never before done,a forced transition to another source of energy.

Yet dark clouds hover. If the Trump-deranged GOP has its way and jiggers enough State vote counting apparatuses and undermines enough ballot box access as they are attempting of do (to “correct” something even the Federalist Society member Trump-appointed judiciary was not able determine was a problem) and they return to power in 2024, we are indeed headed for a descent into a dystopian nightmare.

So this is what it's come to..

                      Some fun guys to have a beer with..

 

 

“We will heal, once the rough beast in the White House slouches off. Something wicked this way goes.”

Maureen Dowd , NY Times Jan 9 2021

Ms Dowd borrowing from the poet John Keats and the novelist Ray Bradbury made for a powerful final thought in her column today. I sincerely hope her optimistic forecast will come to past. The dark vermin-like swarms of figures crawling all over the iconic Capitol Building, hanging from balconies and jamming into any open orifice, was truly an alarming sight. Was this merely an incoherent and disorganized attempt at invading the sacrosanct halls of Congress while it was in session to make a point – or more? It looked like much more. The Trump family and their shrinking cadre of acolytes after having encouraged this act of sedition instead of leading it as promised, the chickenshits then retired to the warm confines of the White House and comfortably watched it on TV letting their shock troops do the dirty work. In the 60's they used to say “the revolution will not be televised”. It now seems attempted counter revolutions are - replacing a democracy with an autocracy. Had Trump had the military or key portions of it on his side, this would have been the first stage of a coup de' etat.

You would think that anyone watching this spectacle of a mob attempting to invade the legislative branch of the government would be truly alarmed. And maybe most were. But 52% of Republicans still believe that the election was actually “stolen” by the Democrats. If that's the case, it logically follows that many Republicans will see this mob as simply brave patriots trying to correct a major injustice.

The durability of festering disinformation is at heart of this. Even such craven political opportunists as Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham have grudgingly admitted that the Biden/Harris victory was honestly won and that the claims of far reaching electoral misdeeds by the Democrats are without merit.  But not the guys in the photo above. Even Trump's erstwhile loyal Attorney General, Bill Barr has abandoned this ship of fools. Meanwhile White House staffers are fleeing right and left. Republican leaders across the board are now having to make the difficult decision– should I go or should stay aboard SS Trump. With 74 million Americans having fallen for his ongoing scam and again voted for him, and moreover 52% still clinging to their Dear Leader's panoply of lies regarding the election, Trump is not a spent force. 

Sedition is a serious charge and like most words that carry heavy meaning it is often carelessly thrown around. But what else is it when a someone loses a presidential election and refuses to acknowledge the outcome? This despite a multitude of failed appeals to courts in every direction including the Supreme Court, many presided over by of judges that were appointed during his tenure. Yet this Big Lie along with host of smaller ones and an interconnected tangle of of outlandish conspiracy theories has circulating through an alternate-reality media ecosystem. The unsubstantiated allegations of result reversing misdeeds by the Demos has gained enough credibly among the masses of 'the disappointed' appear to have given Trumpism a post-election second life. Enter Senate GOP bottom feeder pols like Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz and a hoard of wannabe players in the House who have cynically taken up the cause and smelling opportunity  instigated the theatrical Congressional proceedings to overturn an election. Even the GOP's devious Senate leadership could not swallow the preposterous proposal to again reexamine the election results by some cobbled together special commission. Yet legally they had to go through the motions.

Is it not undermining of the basic tenets of our democracy to have Donald Trump traitorously encourage a huge demonstration to coincide with this Congressional sham? Then disastrous result - thousands of misguided, mal-informed, passionately angry citizens believing themselves to be “true patriots” many armed traveled to Washington DC from all over the country to express their wrath over a 'stolen election'. Proudly displaying the Stars and Stripes they so adored, they apparently never realized they were taking a giant step toward negating the very democracy their fluttering flags stood for.

Unfortunately despite all of this, a majority of Republican voters still believe Trump was cheated out of his rightful victory. They see it as their side's version of the BLM demonstrations that often got out of hand. Their pundits are comparing the January 6 melee in terms property damage to the BLM demonstrations throughout the summer. BLM demonstrations, albeit an unfortunate subset of looters and arsonists, did not attack Congress. BLM was a response to seemingly never ending series of videos of what amounted to extrajudicial execution of Blacks by police and racist vigilantes. The overwhelming majority of BLM supporter did not support property damage, etc. And they never attacked a Congress while in session. Whereas the pro-Trumpian demonstrators from interviews mostly supported the storming of the Capitol even if they never made it inside themselves. They did not see it as dangerous precedent aimed at the very fundamentals of democratic process. As this sorts itself out how many of ordinary GOP stalwarts will side with the Trumpian insurrectionists and how many will choose a different faction in their now fractured party?

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The next to last day of a very bad year.

 This was written yesterday December 30^th . But things are about the same today..

 

 

 

 

Covid-19 patient who has had a stroke is prepared to be flown to another hospital.

 

One word about today's news – bad! Living in California I appear to be if not in the exact epicenter of the global pandemic in its vicinity.  All hell is breaking loose in Southern California. Covid-19 has besieged the entire world for 11 long months and now it is attacking California with a vengeance. The US is fairing worst than any other country in the world both in terms of the shear number of reported cases over 19.5 million (with 183,058 added today) and our number of of fatalities so far with 338,769.  The NY Times' color coded world map denoting the degree of seriousness shows the US with a dark rouge color (the color coding shades out to beige in countries where Covid-19 is under control, with shades of orange in the middle)  Also, interestingly the Times has changed the way they sort countries maybe to lessen our embarrassment. They no longer show them descending from most cases which usually correlates with most deaths where we would be firmly at the top. Instead they now sort them by the fatality rate (deaths per 100,000 in the last 7 days). This leads to obscure small countries with serious outbreaks and limited resources to lead the pack like Liechtenstein and Croatia with 3.8 and 1.6 deaths per 100,000 respectively). But here the USA even by that metric we are still not doing well. We, the richest country in the world of  over 190 countries, are still way up in 18th place in terms of death rate with 0.7. We are tied with a a whole host of well off European countries that have well endowed state-of the-art medical care but serious outbreaks.

So much for Governor Gavin Newsom's great leadership and Californians' feeling of self righteousness and superiority with our low numbers all spring and summer. We are now looking a lot like southern Europe or NY City earlier in the year in crisis mode. Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties are being hammered with hospitals filled beyond capacity, and being driven to battlefield triage measures. Ambulances, unable unload critically ill suffering patients, are forced into a holding patterns. Lobbies, corridors, gifts shops are filled with beds. The staff are working 12 hr plus shifts. They have descended into a ring of hell.

. Yet on other fronts things also suck. 'The Trump' despite being voted out of office continues to cling to outrageous claims of vague unfounded, ill-defined widespread vote counting conspiracies engineered by the (otherwise inept) Democratic Party. Or else he is claiming that huge quantities of ballots should be simply thrown out. The problem is that Trump knows that nearly half of the country (but importantly not more than half) voted for his fat ass even as he lost.  And as we know the hoards of of MAGA hat wearing fools believe anything this world renown liar says. So, despite like 86 court decisions against him and Republican sanctioned counts, he still claims he actually won. To his many acolytes he was cheated by the evil, baby eating, liberal/socialist, corrupt, latte drinking Coastal Elites. He with his minions in tow want to cling to the absurdity that he really won in not only in the three swing states (that he only barely won in 2016) but also Georgia, where Republicans ran the elections. And now, and you can't make this up, Trump is calling for the Republican governor of Georgia to resign. All of this hopefully will help the two senatorial run-off Demo candidates, Ossoff and Warnott, win  Now today(12/30) a proto-fascist aspiring 2024 GOP presidential candidate, from Missouri (with the redneckian name of Josh Hawley) wants to vote against the Congress's procedural proforma certification of the Electoral College vote next week. Apparently he wants to set up some kind of Biden-eliminating Congressional fight. But most legal analysts see this as simply cheap political theater that will go nowhere. 

Trump is not introspective or self critical enough to realize how close he came to actually winning had he not been so anti-science and stubbornly adverse to listening to people who know more than he does. He could have let the experts at CDC and NHC guide our national response to the pandemic from its inception. A rational response would made a world of difference. His criminally negligent handling of the Covid-19 response was not lost on many potentially pro-Trump ordinary voters who vote based on their personal financial well being and pay little attention to the never ending psychodrama of Dems vs Repubs.  Despite the Mueller Investigation, the Impeachment, immigrant children being put in cages, and the daily batch of Tweeted lies and fairy tales, enough apolitical non-ideological voters in the swing states would have put him back in – legally. But his full-a-shit, know-it-all style finally caught up with him. Let's hope as a disgraced one-term President his influence will wain as he confronts his many upcoming legal and financial challenges – that is if he can be physically pried out of the White House come January 20.

It's got to get better once Biden takes over as uninspiring and charisma-challenged as he is. At least he still believes in a democratic transfer of power. If badly needed restructuring and serious reform are not in the cards, at least we don't have some dude as president that aspires to be a Valimir Putin or a Mohammed bin Salman.

* Numbers from NY Times based on Johns Hopkins data base